Queues - we love 'em

[davidjpowell]

Earlier this week had a short flight from Doncaster Sheffield Airport on a Flybe jet, serviced I think by Swissair.

At the appointed time we all heard the dispatcher request the 16 passengers or so...

We duly trotted off to have our boarding passes checked, and out into the uninsulated unheated corridor and set-off down the stairs to the 'exit'. (Doncaster being poor - the exit does not have a door - just a barrier....)

Now you would expect that as there are not many of us, and we've been requested that they would be ready for us...

Nope. 15 minutes we were kept there for. Not only was it cold, but people were stacked on the stairs. To my mind this has the potential to be quite dangerous. If someone fell ill, wobbled, dropped a big piece of hand luggage, quite the dominoes - compared to leaving us where we were.

So what gives? This is actually a pretty common occurrence in my experience, and I feel grumpy....

[DaveReidUK]

Reminds me of an experience at DXB in February (well apart from the cold bit :O).

Flight to SGN was called, and it was on a stand in the middle of nowhere, so everyone piled onto the escalator down to a small coach boarding area.

Of course the coaches weren't ready and the doors to the outside were still closed, but that didn't stop a full 777-300's worth of passengers all attempting to occupy the same small space at the same time.

For the last batch of passengers coming down the escalator with no space to get off it at the bottom, it had the potential to turn into a very nasty accident. Fortunately, it didn't.

[Hotel Tango]

I think it's Swissport. Has happened a few times on my EWG flights outbound BHX. Down the stairs for external boarding only to be held between 5 to 10 minutes on the stairway due to locked door at the bottom. Can't for the life of me understand the logic of that procedure. Last time I was still seated in the lounge and could see the pax standing on the stairs, so stayed put. An irate agent sternly reminded me the flight was boarding. I had to point out that it wasn't! :hmm::)

[PAXboy]

Ditto Luton for all of the above. Except the gates cannot be seen from the lounge. I think the problem is that each section want to off load pax to the next section ASAP.

Get them through security. Get them through the shops. Get them to the gate early. This means that they cannot be blamed for pax being late as the call was early. Simples!

The fact that the gates are not designed for this (to save money) is not their concern or problem. I suspect that 'flight boarding' has replaced 'go to gate' to get pax out of bars and shift blame. Since the staff won't go to the gate until needed (they don't have spare time) there is no one to manage the pax being shoved down the stairs from behind.

One day, there will be a really nasty accident but until someone goes to A&E, or the morgue, nothing will change. That's my cynical view of modern life. Ask for low fares and when outsourcing and disjointed services present problems? Ignore them until you are forced to do something. Normalisation of deviance and all that.

[ExXB]

Hurry up and wait, the joys of air travel.

If I were you I'd complain to the retailers that the handling agents procedures interrupt your valuable shopping experience. You almost bought that bottle of Krug, except you were told to go to the gate urgently. [Irony]

[Celtic_Plumber]

Same happens at some of the Easyjet gates at LPL. Grim, steel, unheated tunnels, down some stairs to a doorway open to the elements save for a flimsy yellow rope. In January when the wind is howling off the Mersey, 5 minutes waiting there and you are numb with cold. The Speedy Boarders get the worst of it.

[ashivraj]

Same at Belfast City on numerous occasions. Sounds like a common problem with UK (and beyond?) regional airports where boarding gates go direct to the tarmac (rather than jet bridges)

[Alsacienne]

You are not alone .... STN and MAN are my recent experiences of the cold tunnel leading nowhere fast!

[Heathrow Harry]

Aberdeen does without the tunnel - but these days the queue is normally getting OFF the tarmac into the terminal.........................

[caaardiff]

It's common procedure in order to achieve quick (30 min or less) turnarounds.
It takes time to scan boarding cards, check passports and other documents (visa's etc), check hand luggage in gauge, charge if necessary etc etc.
Once the last passengers are off from the inbound it should only be a couple of minutes until boarding is ready for the outbound.
The issue is that if boarding through the gate started at the same time the cabin was actually ready, you would never achieve an on time departure.
It's the not very nice process of squeezing through as many passengers before the cabin is ready meaning majority of the checks are done and the gate can close on time and cabin be ready for an on time pushback.
Although if i'm reading this right, 16 passengers? That's a bit unnecessary.